Adaptive Curmudgeon

Through rain obscured visor I could see the flashing lights of the tow truck’s chase car in the far distance. He and his entourage was the biggest thing on the road. I was the smallest. Then again we were the only people on the road. Traffic had completely vanished. If I was catching up that meant he was going slow.

That probably meant there was a crosswind.

I felt the cold rain against skin. Only a few hours ago, I’d been caked in sweat and sawdust. Now I had the best chill a man could ask for. I felt completely rejuvenated.

I thought about all the cringing sorrowful people who’ve recently castrated themselves and, to the extent they could, the world. What would they think of me; soaked and grinning, a madman carefully navigating a swirling dangerous environment?

They spent two years hiding in their basement. How many precious moments have been lost? What portion of a limited mortal lifespan can be burned on the altar of safety before it hurts too deeply. For me? Steal a minute and I’ll never forgive. For them? The prison of their mind is a comfortable safe space.

Whatever it might have been, we know what it is now. Covid is not the Black Plague. The dead were not stacked like cordwood on the streets of Manhattan. Yet, society reels from the orgy of terror. Why did they do it? Perhaps they enjoyed it?

This has happened before. On October 22, 1844 the Earth was not destroyed by fire at Christ’s Second Coming. The sun rose just like any other day on our glorious green planet. The Millerites were so vexed they coined the term The Great Disappointment. There was no fire and brimstone… what a bummer.

They must lust for it. Not actual challenge. Anyone who wants can find actual challenge. Select your mountain to climb; give it a shot and either summit or fail as appropriate. What they covet is the idea; not the reality. Lifestyles that grind to a halt over the possibility of danger. A worldview that confuses social media with reality! How many of their “triggers” come from bots and how many from self-limiting humans. For that matter, what’s the practical difference between self-limited humans and bots?

How sad. To have carefully avoided life’s vital energy has got to be the worst death of all.

Lightning struck a few miles behind me with a terrific crack. It illuminated the road ahead and I could see a patch of trees ahead flailing wildly in the wind. Their motion was subtly different. The wind was crossing the road perpendicularly and this particular terrain was something of a funnel. I moved toward the center line, checked my seating position, leaned slightly, and let my body relax.

Don’t fight it, ride it.

The predicted gust caught me on the side. An insistent but manageable nudge against a properly balanced motorcycle. I shrugged most of it off but also gave way a little. The bike shifted with the wind and away from the centerline; just a foot or two. No worries, I had the whole dam road at my disposal and I’d already slowed down. No muss, no fuss. I planned for it to happen, it happened as I’d planned.

As abruptly as it happened, it was over. We (the bike and I) were out of that little vortex and back in the regular stream of rain and wind. I wasn’t aggressively leaned over fighting it so I didn’t have to pull out of a sudden swerve when the wind partially dissipated. This ‘aint my first rodeo.

A turnip can drive a modern car. Strap a human slab of meat into a three point harness; equip it with anti-lock brakes, automatic transmission, sophisticated traction control, and all the modern gadgetry… it’ll drive exactly as well as any quasi-sentient meat out there. The beings you’ll find on an average road are almost entirely like that. Meat will roll along merrily, staying more or less between the lines while its empty head is distracted by a cell phone in one hand and its ass in the other.

Not so for me. A motorcycle surfing the leading edge of a windstorm has a lot less safety margin. I must handle the situation using mind more than brawn. Fortunately reality gives me all the hints I need. For example, when it rains I get wet. Who can deny that? Who would fail to acknowledge different traction conditions in the rain? I don’t need a computer for that. A skull and its contents are just fine.

Also, I have focus. Unlike the meat in an SUV, I have skin in the game. If I fuck up, I crash. I hope that doesn’t happen, but I accept that as part of life. Perhaps many people spend their lives without the singular focus I mustered just to ride through a storm?

It could be worse. I could be sitting home getting triggered by someone’s mean tweets.

A few miles further and I’d caught up with the tow truck. It was a whole lot of rolling mass to consider. A monster tow truck pulling a semi tractor still hitched to a sixty foot grain trailer; complete with chase car. The wind shifted again and I felt it tearing at my windward arm. Physics doesn’t give a shit about your plans. No fuckin’ way was I going to pass a towed empty trailer under those conditions.

A turnip would hit the blinker (or not) and rocket past, hydroplaning the whole way. No guarantee they’d be able to define, much less detect, hydroplaning. Their car would probably figure it out (or not). Expecting sensors in a wheel hub to anticipate the blast of wind off a hundred feet of heavy rolling stock in a windstorm is asking a lot. A good driver knows this but turnips aren’t very bright. That’s why insurance is so expensive.

Then again, the tow truck and I were both doing well. Nobody operates a tow truck (or a motorcycle) by accident. However bad the wind and rain might look at the moment, the flashing lightning behind us looked far worse. We’d apparently matched the front’s speed. We were in the rain but the mess behind us wasn’t gaining.

I stayed a quarter mile behind the tow truck and thoroughly enjoyed my ride. I felt the water seep through my mesh jacket. I felt the hum of droplets hammering on my chest. I felt alive.

In a dozen miles, too soon really, I was at my turn. I gingerly puttered down a few miles of very muddy dirt, and happily pulled into the open garage. Once inside, I killed the engine and put down the kickstand.

That’s when it hit! BOOM! Like a wall of physical resistance, the real beating heart of the storm swept past and through. It happened just seconds after I’d parked. Lightning flashed and rain came down in buckets; though I was already under cover. Retrieving my paperback from the saddlebags (bone dry!) I bumped into my cell phone. It was on. Mrs. Curmudgeon had forwarded a tornado warning announcement and sent a follow up text warning me to get my ass home. I scanned the horizon, no funnel clouds; though these certainly were the right conditions.

I couldn’t help chuckling as I closed the garage door. It had been a glorious little adventure. I’ll think about this day when some heartless Karen is going on an estrogen bitchfest about safety; GMOs, global warming, second hand smoke, recycle or die, wear a mask, get a booster, don’t go there, don’t go alone, don’t say that, don’t do that, don’t think that. Cower in your house and depend on everyone else to do everything that needs doing, because they’re presumably disposable… don’t you know how dangerous the world is?

Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. I don’t fight it, I ride it.

There’s only one intersection in that town. Three stop signs and one road with right of way. I came to a full stop just as a huge tow truck rolled through the intersection. It was one of those giant trucks meant for towing semis. It was lugging a semi tractor and its 60’ grain trailer.

“Man I hope that grain trailer is empty.” I thought. I’m not sure how much those huge tow trucks can handle but the driver had 26 out of 28 wheels on the ground (towed semi’s drive wheels were suspended) and that’s a workout for anyone. I once read a formula that implied a ratio between wheelbase and weight capacity. I’ve since forgotten it, but the tow truck was very long. It had to be a hell of a load. He had a chase car and he deserved it.

Plunk! The first raindrop hit like a marble dropped from space. Widely spread big fat water drops were starting to fall. They landed loudly on my helmet and splattered into my shoulders. They soaked instantly through my mesh jacket. Cold as ice. I’m not an expert in atmospheric physics but surely they came close to being hailstones.

I revved the engine anxiously but the tow truck was followed closely by three fire trucks from the local VFD. Something interesting had happened. I hadn’t noticed any sign the towed semi had burned, but then again I hadn’t been looking. Three fire trucks and the biggest tow rig in the county? There are stories that I don’t know and I was seeing clues of one. In the old days, I’d read about it in tomorrow’s newspaper. Now I’ll either hear gossip or never know.

Plunk, plunk, whap! More drops fell and they fell hard; less like rain and more like little water balloons filled with icewater. I patiently waited for the VFD to lumber through the intersection. They pulled off into the fire department. Finally my coast was clear.

You might think I lit it up and blasted through the intersection. Of course not! Fresh rain on hot pavement is a recipe for a thin film of oily water and correspondingly low traction. I rolled out with the decorum of a limousine carrying royalty.

A half mile later I was up to highway speeds and out of town. Unfortunately, the rain had overtaken me; no longer individual raindrops but a steady pummeling on my helmet. Rain soaked through my jeans and my mesh jacket (as it was designed) offered no protection. Even so, I was clearly moving faster than the front. I was in steady rain but nothing exceptional. In my rear view mirror lightning flashed in rapid succession as the maelstrom let loose on the town I’d just left. Better to be here than back there!

Rain battered my face shield and blurred some of my vision. The sun hadn’t set but the clouds obscured it to a false dusk. I let off the throttle. No point in haste. Avoidance and evasion were played out. Now I was fully involved with an “interesting” ride. I might as well accept it and work with the risks as they are and not as they seemed when I was happily reading a paperback just 15 minutes ago.

Statistically, motorcycles are deadly. I know that. You know that. Grandma knew it too. Back in her day she rode a Harley. When this bike was new I gave her a ride on it. She’s dead now. I miss her. Someday I’ll be dead too. I know that. You know that. Current times being what they are, I have a feeling that lots of chronological adults are still grappling with the concept.

Statistically, rain is a serious additional risk to a motorcycle. There are cyclists that do not ride in rain. I am not one of them.

Statistically, darkness is a serious additional risk to a motorcycle. There are cyclists that do not ride at night. I am not one of them.

I rode on through the rain and darkness; paying very careful attention to my surroundings. What other life is there to live?

I’m not done yet…

Clouds which had been threatening all afternoon had coalesced into a deep opaque whole. Sunset was nigh. Low angle light slipped between the darkening skies above and the shimmering horizon below; like heat softened metal hovering just above the anvil. A hammer was about to fall.

I turned a full 360 degrees assessing the situation. It didn’t look good. The brooding skies I’d first noticed were the best of the lot. In the other direction the clouds looked positively malevolent. Wind was beginning to gust. I know the prevailing winds of the area. It was blowing in the wrong direction. Not good.

My plan had been to top off at the nearby gas station. That idea went out the window. This wasn’t yet an emergency, but it wasn’t a good time to fiddle fart around.

My motorcycle, a carbureted anachronism, takes a few seconds to warm up. I’m in the habit of thumbing the ignition while I’m standing next to it putting on my helmet.

Hustling to secure my helmet I became aware the bike was running without thinking about starting it. It was as if I’d willed the beast to life. Jacket zipped, gloves tightened, leg over, clutch in, kickstand up, clicked into gear, and under way. It happened in the smooth motion that comes from a thousand iterations and the tacit acknowledgment that I wanted to be anywhere but there.

Rolling out of the tiny town was frustrating. It took restraint to keep her under 30 MPH. The local yokel cops are pretty decent overall but they’ll gladly help balance their budget with a ticket issued to a flighty biker. So I reined in a “fight or flight” reaction even as I registered that not a soul was out and about. Small towns “roll up the sidewalks” early but even so I expected some human activity.

Wheeling through what felt like a ghost town at exactly the speed limit gave my brain time to catch up with my situation. A storm, a very bad one, was about to hit. You’d have to be a fool not to acknowledge that! Then again, so what? I’ve ridden through storms before. It’s a skill like any other; keep the wheels on the ground and don’t panic. You’ll be fine. The worst I’d get is soaked.

As my grandmother used to say “so you’re wet, you won’t melt!”

Wise lady she was. Also, not one to put up with bullshit. I hope I live up to her ways.

I did a little mental math. The winds were blowing south. I was heading south. The full force of the storm was still impending and not a done deal. If I could get out of town I’d be on open road and there’s not many storms that can outrun a bike. I might get wet but I’d likely be out of it before things got too exciting.

More to come…

The day had been unconscionably hot. Humidity hung like a haze over the day’s plans and lowered my productivity. I’d worked my tractor as much as I dared and then shut it down to cool. (The same heat that affects me will affect a machine. There’s nothing heroic about abusing equipment; especially equipment which is an expensive bitch to repair and maintain.)

By late afternoon, clouds had built up. It was still muggy and uncomfortable but the dam would burst in due time. Sooner or later rain would cool things down.

Fretting over lost work hours (I have more to do than time to do it) I made a heroic last stand at the woodshed. Covered with sweat and sawdust I used my little electric chainsaw to buck a small pile of limbwood I’d stashed on the sawbuck. Soon I had it stacked in the woodshed and was pleased to have made progress against the ever present specter of winter. (I’m impressed with the saw. I’d run one battery down and half of another battery without overheating the motor; though the handle did get a bit warm. I grudgingly admit a non-gas saw is darned handy for small jobs.)

By then I was all worked out. I took shelter inside. I wasn’t in the sweltering sun but it still wasn’t particularly cool. Folks might not believe it but not every building has central AC. I hydrated and consoled myself that I’d worked pretty well for my age. I’d been reluctantly but reasonably wise about it. When I was 19 I’d have accomplished twice as much, but I’d have likely overtaxed myself and spent the next day or two burned out.

A little before sunset I decided I needed ice cream. Had I not worked? Did I not deserve a reward? The rain hadn’t materialized and, if I hurried, the nearest ice cream shop would still be open. I hopped on my motorcycle and scooted away.

I have a protective mesh jacket that’s ideal in these circumstances. I bought it for a ride across Death Valley many years ago and always like when I can use it. It’s useless in all but the worst heat so rarely get to wear it. After a long bitter winter and an ugly spring that was nearly as bad as winter, it felt great to wear my “desert jacket”. I let the winds flow through the mesh and felt the efforts of the day ebbing from my core.

Ice cream is delicious, especially if you earned it. I felt like a kid again. I remembered hot days stacking hay bales and the ensuing ice cream cones. Then again, I’m very glad I don’t have to stack hay bales. All hail hydraulics and round bales!

I sat in the ice cream shop, which had better air conditioning than I’d left, and idly read a book. Not a Kindle download either. It was a plain old dead tree paperback. An old sci-fi book from 1976; written before science fiction got weak and crawled up its own ass. I’d read it before but was nonetheless consumed with the story.

Eventually it dawned on me that I was the only one in the ice cream shop. They were pointedly mopping the floor in my direction. I pulled myself out of the story and, mumbling apologies, shuffled for the door.

I stepped from that ice cream shop into a different world.

Stay tuned…

I was talking with a fellow about President “Most Votes In American History” Biden’s sanctions. Intended to punish Russia after it entered Ukraine, they’ve been somewhere between an “own goal” and a faceplant. I suppose charitably you could say they haven’t yet bankrupted everyone who’s against Russia… yet.

Is Pyrrhic sanctions a legit phrase?

I used an example from Blazing Saddles but he’d never seen Blazing Saddles! I was shocked; what a nightmare! This is far more important than geopolitics! Everyone needs to see Blazing Saddles!

[My last post had too much politics. I apologize. I was trying to describe how manufactured events continue being manufactured with or without reality based causes. I probably failed. Please cut me some slack, I posted from McDonalds and no deep thoughts have ever emerged from that venue. I offer today a more positive post.]

Ten minutes. No words. No politics. No bullshit. Absolutely gorgeous and poignant.

Do yourself a favor and schedule ten minutes. Turn off the phone. Hide from the kids. Pour yourself a cup of coffee (or bourbon) and enjoy a glimpse of completely positive art.

I’ve been “off grid” and will stay off a little longer. This is for three reasons.

1. I’m in a place with chitty cell service.
2. Even if I had service, I’m super busy and have no time to play emotional grabass amid propaganda.
3. The post collapse reason: I fear the “Schrödinger’s Cat of Stupid”.

Reason #3 is new. Constant serial failed panics have been happening weekly or bi-weekly for a long time, I dread to see the next stupid irrational thing.

I say “failed panics” because they have a purpose. Cretins in DC (of both parties) want the populace perpetually alarmed and therefore easily manipulated. It worked for a while but, like junkies hitting bottom, the people are exhausted and the drug of panic has less pull than it once did.

Americans in general are slowly, gradually, incrementally, pulling their head out of their ass. They’re no longer exhibiting the desired response of knee jerk deference to authorities. Fine grained central control is no longer just assumed to be OK. Cretins in DC are terrified!

The last two years stampeding about in an orgy of “I support the latest thing” has run its course. Free thinkers cut loose ages ago but even the weakest of minds have been overstimulated and two years of dumb shit has shut down their cerebellum. Many are embarrassed by what they did. Post-Covid true believers have the hangover feel. “Did I really do that?” A few hopeless Kool-aid drinkers are still pining for the return of COVID but nobody takes them seriously anymore. DC quakes in fear as the masses settle back to earth.

Objective truth is a thing which exists whether you wish it or not.

The sane, diminished in numbers but still populous, no longer just accepts things. The precursors to cattle cars and trashing the rule of law “just for a few weeks during the current emergency” is a harder sale. Folks are standing on the loading ramp to the Utopian new world order but they’ve stopped stumbling forward. They’re thinking. “Pretty much everything they’ve said for two years has been a lie or blown up their face, why should I do what’s demanded again?”

Those of us who never drank the Kool-aid have also changed. We’re less motivated to try talking the crowd out of their latest faceplant. We shrug and continue doing what we do… independently. “If they haven’t figured it out by now, it’s not our problem.”

I feel like that. Don’t you? After COVID and the 2020 election, I’m more willing to let people experience the fruits of their decisions. Some folks learn from history, but others must piss on the electric fence. Who am I to rob them of the experience?

Karen now has to choose between baby formula that doesn’t exist and $6 gas to get to a job that doesn’t matter but the boss desperately wants her to commute. I don’t care. I no longer wish to talk her out of her next dumb idea. Take on massive debt for an EV car? Sure. A degree in advanced pointlessness? Fine. Fifteen boosters, an all yoghurt diet, and some pyramid crystals you bought online? Sure. Get a face tattoo while you’re at it; it’ll be fun! I feel freed of what formerly was a kind of responsibility. The Gods of the Copybook Headings will sort everything out.

The reduction in overall mad stampeding panic is also a time of risk. People who used fear to get power are desperate to restart panic anew. They’re flipping over rocks and looking for ghosts.

“We gotta’ protect our phony baloney jobs!” They whine. Then they fire up the panic machine: “Have you heard about monkeypox? What about greedy oil companies, Russian bogeymen, scary racist libertarian whackdoodles, people who don’t check in with Facebook, ghost guns, radon, asbestos, hanta virus, gluten, melting glaciers?” They also try random orders, “get another booster shot or white supremacists could hack your Netflix account!” It’s not working.

Reality seeps through the façade. Nobody cares what some douchebag said on Twitter on if gas prices have doubled (tripled?) and you’re out of cash. The Afghanistan retreat of 2021 makes following President Droolcup into Ukraine sound like a bad bet. Nobody who just dropped an extra two bucks on a six pack of beer to wash away the sorrows of an evaporating 401(k) is interested in the nutsack on a faux-oppressed YouTube influencer.

Which brings me to Schrödinger’s Cat. Until you open the box, the cat is both alive and dead. Once you peek, the form is chosen.

As soon as I plug back into the Matrix, the choice will be made. I sense that society will inevitably choose one dumb distraction among many. What will it be?

Here are my guesses:

• Fight Russia until the last Ukrainian is dead? Nah! That’s played out. (When I checked out propaganda was still reporting that plucky glorious Ukrainian freedom fighters were beating Russkie ass like a rented mule. Sure, and I’m a Chinese jet pilot. I don’t know if the press is still sticking to the narrative but sooner or later the real situation will be apparent.)
• A close subset would be a false flag blamed on Russia. It won’t work in 2022. No matter how ugly or photogenic it is, we’re just not in the mood to wrap in the flag and have a parade on behalf of the guy who won more votes than any other candidate in history but went sub-Carter in a year. At this point, if someone nukes Baltimore I won’t believe it until I drive there and wave a Geiger counter myself. Even then I’ll wonder which three letter agency set it off.
• Diesel gets expensive enough that truckers just park their rigs? Even odds on that. Trucks deliver stuff and life without stuff sucks. Biden having a press event where he shrieks at truckers (as if that’ll start a Kenworth’s engine) would fit his pattern.
• Gas breaks $5 by July 4th and “normie the griller” has a fit? Nah! It comes on the heels of an Orange Menace that made American into a net exporter. We all know it could happen again.
• Food shortage; like for real this time? “We’re out of Cool Ranch Doritos but there are Pringles” turns into “I will fight you for this can of beans”. Shortages are more or less baked in the cake now but I don’t buy this one for fat complacent Americans.
• Taiwan? Hard to say but China seems too patient. Why rush things in 2022 when we’re already flaming out? Regardless of when it happens, we won’t be able to do jack shit. Look at a globe. Taiwan will fall unless Taiwan is monumentally bad ass, and that doesn’t appear to be the case. As for us? Nations that can’t reliably make baby formula aren’t equipped to pick fights with China.
• A big power outage? That’s a good possibility! Oft predicted, and seasonally practiced for a decade in California. Would two weeks of no hot water in Newark or no AC in Phoenix work in President Potato’s favor?
• The January 6th commission? Bwa ha ha ha ha… no fuckin way! If Stalinist show trials were going to work, they’ve been unleashed in 2021.
• Riot season? I doubt that one too. Deplorable America is more or less willing to let St. Louis or Portland burn itself to the ground. We just don’t care anymore. If cities want to set their own ass on fire, fuck ’em. Also, we know it won’t spread. Rioters who leave the support of city politics will be instantly roasted by rednecks who’ve been waiting their whole lives for the opportunity to do it.
• Gun control? Nah! It’s a cliché. Rhinos will roll over because they’re gutless pussies but who cares? Someone somewhere will pass something about adjustable drift pins on rifles a particular shade of magazine capacity because 9mm blows lungs through the bayonet lug… blah blah blah. Clinton did in in 1994 and all he did was cost Al Gore his turn at the big chair. That was 28 years ago and they’ve spent every intervening moment convincing us to support the second amendment. We even got a two year refresher course! Government sponsored riots in 2020, Australia going full Nuremberg (along with Europe, New Zealand, and Canada), and one hour response times in a school shootings are why Americans have been buying a million guns a month. Burning Minneapolis and subsequently cheating in an election won’t convince anyone to disarm. Also, people who drop their own coin on a firearm are more serious than dipshits preening on Twitter.

None of those feel right. Returning the people to a mindless froth will require something bigger, dumber, wilder, more dangerous, and more irrational. I draw a blank trying to imagine it. I write about squirrels and talk to trees but I just can go that dumb.

Suppose Godzilla fucks Cthulhu and gets Monkeypox in Detroit while stepping on a gay kitten during a riot about banned, gluten free, student loans on Independence day during a meteor shower? That’s just another Tuesday now.

I feel a weird urge to stay out of it. Let the rest of the world decide the reason for their newest panic. Whatever the form of the destroyer, I want it witnessed first by someone else. So I remain mostly off grid.

As always, watch your six and never go full retard.

A.C.

Light posting for a while. I’m going off grid a few days.